


Phillipa

by mercurybard



Category: Inception (2010)
Genre: Alternate Universe, F/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2010-11-26
Updated: 2010-11-26
Packaged: 2017-10-13 09:30:48
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 628
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/135770
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/mercurybard/pseuds/mercurybard
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>She's not trapped at a perpetual five, no matter what her father might think.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Phillipa

**Author's Note:**

> Inception belongs to Chris Nolan. Just playing in the sandbox.

_n. The beginning of something, such as an undertaking_

"My name is Arthur. I work with your father."

She tries to push past him into the lecture hall, but he inserts cleverly between her and the simplicity of the History of Architecture I: Caves to Cathedrals.

"He needs your help," this Arthur continues.

Her eyes narrow. "My father needs a lot help. Don't think there's anything I can do for him though."

"He's your father."

"He murdered my mother."

"You don't really believe that, do you?"

"Why else would he run?"

He smiles. "Why don't you see for yourself?"

*

There is nothing in reality that can compare to the power she has in the dream. All she has to do is think, and the world conforms itself to her will. Oh, there are rules, but the rules are far less restrictive than, say, gravity. And Cobb's there--laying the rules out for her and then breaking all of them.

'Do as I say; not as I do'...isn't that the lesson all parents try to teach their kids?

She wouldn't know. Both her parents have been out of her life for a long, long time.

*

She slides into Cobb's mind as easy as sliding the needle into her vein. Arthur says he goes under like this when they're not working because it's the only way he can still dream.

Arthur's wrong.

Cobb's dream-world is a sick, sad place full of light and laughter. She stands side-by-side with him as he strains to catch a glimpse of his children's faces. 'Look at me!' she wants to scream but doesn't. What he wants so badly is right behind him.

Instead, she makes a dash for the elevator and presses the forbidden button. 'B' for 'Basement'; 'B' for 'Bad'; 'B' for 'Bearable, un'. If she thought the upper levels of Cobb's mind were heart-wrenching, it can't compare to what she discovers in the hotel suite at the bottom of the elevator shaft.

She steps on a broken wine glass, feels it crunch under the sole of her shoe as a high, ringing note fills the air. Swallows. Takes another step forward, closer to the sinister but so familiar woman seated on the couch. Cobb's wife is beautiful and horrible and trapped, so very trapped deep within his mind.

No wonder she's intruding on every heist he pulls--it's the only chance she gets to try and free herself from him.

*

Arthur holds her hair back later as she retches. Her dinner, she vomited up in the gutter outside the warehouse where they've set up their base of operations. This is just dry-heaving.

When she's done, he sits back against the hotel bathtub and pulls her into his lap. Runs a washcloth under the tap and places it on the back of her neck. Cold water dribbles down the back of her shirt.

"That's not her," she mumbles, drawing her knees as tightly to her as she can. "That...thing he has hidden away in his mind isn't her. It isn’t Mom."

Arthur drapes the cloth over the side of the tub and soothes a hand over her back. "The Architect has to rely on the target's mind to fill in the blanks. You give the dream form, and they have to supply all the details. He's been carrying her in his head for so long that it's no wonder pieces of her are missing. Things he's forgotten...things he never knew exactly but still made her who she was. That's why we have to free her from him."

"No," she says, tilting her head so that her mouth rests against the column of his throat. She can feel his pulse fluttering under her lips. "We have to free him from her."


End file.
